While you don’t usually see military-related stories here at Inhabitat, here’s an eco-worthy exception: the Zephyr is an unmanned aerial vehicle, which is powered entirely by solar power. The emissions-free, solar-powered Zephyr recently made headlines by breaking the record for the longest-duration unmanned flight!
Unfortunately for the team, the first flight cannot be fully confirmed, as it was fairly top secret event, and thus they cannot claim the record. Before you ask though, the team did second attempt which resulted in a continuous 33 hour flight. This flight is currently being verified by the World Air Sports Federation. Meanwhile, we here at Inhabitat eagerly await for the launch of the manned Solar Plane, which we hope will someday be our mode of transportation around the world. Viva la sol!
[...] flying the first 24-hour flight and proving that a sun-powered plane can fly at night, but the Zephyr has blown that record out of the water with its almost complete 2 week-long [...]
NASA has a solar powered, long-duration flight prototype that, thankfully, wasn’t intended for military purposes. Helios project: http://www.nasa.gov/centers/dryden/news/FactSheets/FS-068-DFRC.html
Helios has since crashed (and perhaps discontinued). We can hope that this military technology will some day live a peacefully civilian life.
[...] : inhabitat.com Leave a [...]